>> Systems are required to ask the user for their age and just trust whatever they say > > This is the thing they actually get right. It removes the inconvenience, privacy invasion, forced use of corporate verifiers with perverse incentives, etc. Meanwhile if the user is actually a child then their age is set by their parent.

Well, maybe. For instance, if a child buys their own device they could set the age to whatever they want.

>> Applications are required to query the system for the user's age range. > > This is classic legislative stupidity. Applications are required to query the user's age range even if they contain no age-restricted content? Brilliant.

Note that AB1043 doesn't actually impose much in the way of requirements about age restricted content. Rather, the way it works is that the developer is then assumed to have "actual knowledge" of the user's age (See 1798.501(b)(2)(A)) and then has to behave accordingly in other age-restricted contexts.